"You're son? He eats his friends."

Big changes have come for Riley in the last few months. As he teeters on the brink of his fourth year on this planet, he's doing all he can to make his mark. Unfortunately, many of those marks were made with his teeth. Along with other rites of passage, like pedaling his own bike, graduating from an enclosed crib and learning to use the potty, Riley has managed to get himself expelled from pre-school. That's right, you read it correctly: Kicked. Out. Of. Pre-school.
If you've seen Ferris Bueller's Day Off, then you know the exact inflection in my voice when I repeated back to the school's owner, "Nine times?" Truthfully, though, I wasn't that surprised. I knew they had a strict Three Strikes and You're Out policy, and I knew that we had surpassed our allotment of strikes. I just kept hoping that this one would be the last one.

Riley bites when he's frustrated that things aren't going his own way. At school, this would happen when he didn't get to sit in the chair he wanted or play with a toy someone else had at the moment. There was no negotiating or reasoning. There was just The Chomp. He averaged one-a-month while a student at Southwood. His teachers and the director were pulling for him, I know (it was even admitted to me that they were hiding his Bite Reports in Holden's file). But the jig was up and they gave us a two-week's notice ... exactly two weeks before escrow was scheduled to close. So in addition to moving, we had to find a new school. And you know how great 2-year-olds are at dealing with change, so we were really looking forward to that 24 hours where he moved to a new house and started a new school.

I'm sure you're wondering why we weren't able to stop the biting. Believe me, we're wondering that, too. We did everything they said to do - short of biting him ourselves, which we think is just hypocritical. And Riley knew biting was wrong. He had the whole script down: "I'm a big boy. Big boys don't bite. Only doggies bite. Biting hurts. Be nice to my friends." It was just that, in the moment, he lost control.

We were lucky that his old daycare was willing and able to take him back for the summer. In the fall, or sooner, he'll start pre-school at the elementary school where Holden will be going. Along with after-school kindercare, the school district runs pre-school, too. So he'll be back in a classroom and they'll both be going to the same place everyday - making our mornings and evenings a lot easier, too.

Oh ... and since his last offense at school nearly two months ago, he's only had one minor biting incident while fighting with Holden. He's never bit again at school.

A lot of people have shared similar stories of their kids getting the boot from pre-school, and that is comforting to know it's common. Many have said we'll look back on this and laugh. I've just hoped that I won't be sharing this story with other moms as we wait in line during visiting hours at the Inmate Reception Center.
And to his credit, Riley's simultaneous transitions were rather seamless. In addition to a new home and school, he's pretty much potty trained himself, learned to sleep in a bed without walls and pedal his tricycle. We were concerned about letting him be free at night, and the first week was a bit of a challenge keeping him in bed. Now, he almost only gets up to use the potty - which he does about three times before going to sleep and a couple times in the morning before 6 a.m.
Despite all the changes, he's remained so very Riley. He is a fun and funny boy with great facial expressions and a desire to make everyone laugh. He does and says whatever Holden does and says, and has learned how to use his imagination to play. They pretend to be firefighters or zoom their cars around looking for parking garages or play bedtime where they take turns putting each other to sleep complete with songs, a kiss and a final yell of "GO TO SLEEP NOW!" (Wonder who says that?)

He whispers, "Poo poo poop" as he sits on the potty and asks loudly of all of us: "Are you my friend?" Then he adds, "Mommy's my friend. Daddy's my friend. Holden's my friend." If we're mad at him when he asks, and we say no, his big lower lip comes out and he looks sad as he demands: "YOU ARE MY FRIEND!"
That's kinda the rub with this kid. He is sweet and friendly, but can really test your limits and patience with his antics. As his vocabulary and communication skills continue to blossom, though, we're sure his life will be less about hurting his friends and more about being one. We're confident that, one day, he'll be a really good one.